Page 338 - Week 02 - Tuesday, 23 February 1993
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. The petitioners draw your attention to the fact that the pharmacy services the St. Vincent de Paul Aged Home and the general ageing population in Campbell.
Your petitioners therefore request the Assembly to:
Create Landlord/Tenant legislation that addresses fair rent, lease agreements and security of tenure.
Petitions received.
QUESTIONS WITHOUT NOTICE
Australian Public Service - Staff Reductions
MR KAINE: Madam Speaker, I direct a question to the Chief Minister. I note that over the last four years the Federal Labor Government has retrenched over 7,000 people in the Public Service. According to Senator Nick Bolkus, he has reduced the staffing numbers in the Department of Administrative Services by 5,000 people in that time. It is further said that they intend to retrench a further 2,300 from the Department of Administrative Services over the next two years and that they plan to cut over 14,000 jobs from the Defence Force. There is also a suggestion that further bodies will be transferred out of Canberra, and currently the Australian Broadcasting Authority planning organisation is under consideration. Does the Chief Minister support the continuation of the kind of reduction of the Public Service that has already taken place and which is foreshadowed to continue in the unlikely event that the Keating Government is returned to office on 13 March?
MS FOLLETT: Madam Speaker, I draw to Mr Kaine's attention that I am actually not responsible for the Federal Government. Having said that, I will say to Mr Kaine that it is a fact that the Commonwealth Public Service in the ACT has grown over the past few years. The figures to which Mr Kaine has drawn attention are, as far as I am aware, nothing more nor less than the normal movements within departments in an effort to make their own structure more efficient or, indeed, to take account of normal staff movements.
I think it pales into insignificance if you set it beside what Mr Kaine's party proposes to do in the unlikely event that they ever gain government in the ACT. Dr Hewson's Fightback package shows that there will be 3,200 jobs cut out of the Public Service. I do not believe that Mr Kaine can deny that. It is also a fact that nobody in the coalition has given any undertaking whatsoever to continue with the York Park development, which means another 1,500 jobs out of the ACT work force. The flow-on effect of those job reductions will be felt also in the private sector. A conservative estimate of the job losses in the private sector as a consequence is some 1,900 positions lost.
We can add to that the horrifying prospect of a Hewson government in industrial relations. The fact is that there is no guarantee that any of those people will have redundancy provisions honoured. Not only will people be losing their jobs hand over fist; they will also be doing so under extremely adverse conditions.
Mr Humphries: That is absolute rubbish.
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